1. Field of the Invention
In this day and age, when the telephone plays an extremely important part in practically everything that is taking place, more effort should be directed at stopping diseases which may be spread through contact with a telephone.
Public telephones, in particular, are handled by a multitude of people each and every day. In the event that just one of this multitude of persons were sick, every subsequent user is subject to infection by whatever germs might be able to sustain themselves until being passed on.
Other than germs, telephones which are handled by large numbers of people may from time to time accumulate other undesirable substances thereon, e.g., grease.
In these respects, although it may not be feasible or probable to eliminate these accumulations at their inception, precautions may be taken by any particular user to resist the spreading of them.
2. Prior Art
A number of attempts have been made to provide a solution to the problems stated above, but all have apparently failed for one reason or another. Surely, the lack of these items on the market in use evidences insufficiency of public acceptance.
One such prior device is shown by U.S. Pat. No. 1,833,643. This patent expressly discloses a protector for only the mouthpiece of a telephone. The protector includes a disinfectant material 18 and an elaborate mechanism for causing the disinfectant to be released onto the mouthpiece.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,238,313 discloses another protector for telephone mouthpieces. While one of the stated objects of the patent is low cost manufacturing of the item, the description includes a complicated construction of a filter 13 for the protector at column 1, line 61 through column 2, line 18.
Two other U.S. Pat, Nos. 3,001,033 and 3,148,249 disclose covers for the mouthpieces only of telephones. The latter of these two patents has as a primary object the interception of particles or germs ejected from the mouth of a user of the telephone. As noted above, incentives to take initial preventive measures is very often lacking. The instant problem is more realistically approached by assuming the presence of particles and/or germs and taking steps to prevent the spreading thereof.
Finally, U.S. Pat. No. 3,169,171 does disclose, if only impliedly, the use of protective covers on both the receivers and transmitter (i.e., mouthpiece) of telephones. However, the suggested solution involves placing identical, wholely independent, caps over each of the receiver and transmitter of a phone. This is surely inconvenient and also possibly uneconomical.